It's official: this past week has been the worst in our club's short history. In fact, any progress we appeared to have made this off-season might as well have not happened. This Toronto FC team is proving that it does not have what it takes to become a contender in this parity-stricken league. 2009 was supposed to be "the year." It very well may be "the year" - the year that we clean house.
Is it time to finally start freaking out about this team, one that looks destined to wind up near the bottom of Eastern Conference yet again? Let's face it, at 4-5-4 and over half of our home season done, we aren't sitting pretty. I said before the match today that if we weren't 7-4-4 in three week's time, I'd have a problem with this team. Well, that's not going to happen, and I have a problem with this team. Here's the funny thing though...if we can string together a few good results, we could be back up to the top of the East. Does anyone see that happening now, though? I sure don't.
On March 14, I appeared on It's Called Football and stressed the importance of home points this year. So far this season, we've taken 11 out of 24 possible home points. Just 11. I won't even complain about being 1-2-2 on the road thus far, but being 3-3-2 at home? That is simply not good enough in this league.
You have to feel that this all has to fall on Mo Johnston's shoulders. Ahead of our first game in Kansas City, there were still question marks over our defending and our attack. Thirteen games later, and those questions are still bouncing around. Has anyone else noticed that we haven't been adequately prepared for a season since we were formed? In our first year, we had a back-three of Andy Boyens, Jim Brennan, and Marco Reda - none of whom had played an MLS match - in our first two matches, with wantaways like Richard Mulrooney and Paolo Nagamura as key components in our midfield. Last season it was the same story: Tyler Hemming started at right midfield in our first match in Columbus with Todd Dunivant on the opposite wing. It looks like this season is the same old story. An opening day win doesn't exactly count as a bright start, and we've only been over .500 by one game this season.
Additions like Adrian Serioux, Dwayne De Rosario, and draft picks Stefan Frei and Sam Cronin have all been hits. Here's the problem though: We still don't have a commanding centre half and we still don't have a lethal striker. We've needed both of these since 2006.
For the record, I don't think that Pablo Vitti's lack of scoring is one of our issues. You can see his talent whenever he has the ball. I believe our main issue is that just about every one of our good attacking moves ends with Chad Barrett, who has a worse soccer IQ than Tie Domi, and couldn't score a penalty on an empty net. His poor distribution and finishing is simply shocking at times, and when you couple this with Marco Velez's 2008-esque defending, we're in a pretty good position to fail.
The irony of this apparently terrible situation is that this team isn't out of it. The season's just about halfway done, and we're certainly in the playoff mix right now. With multi-game road trips and the Gold Cup looming this summer, the question remains as to whether or not will we be in that playoff mix come September? On this date last year, we were 6-4-2, and we faded over the summer to finish last in the East. Is there a supporter out there who sees any different destiny for this team?
Where's the freaking voice of reason here? Isn't it time for something to change?
Is it time to finally start freaking out about this team, one that looks destined to wind up near the bottom of Eastern Conference yet again? Let's face it, at 4-5-4 and over half of our home season done, we aren't sitting pretty. I said before the match today that if we weren't 7-4-4 in three week's time, I'd have a problem with this team. Well, that's not going to happen, and I have a problem with this team. Here's the funny thing though...if we can string together a few good results, we could be back up to the top of the East. Does anyone see that happening now, though? I sure don't.
On March 14, I appeared on It's Called Football and stressed the importance of home points this year. So far this season, we've taken 11 out of 24 possible home points. Just 11. I won't even complain about being 1-2-2 on the road thus far, but being 3-3-2 at home? That is simply not good enough in this league.
You have to feel that this all has to fall on Mo Johnston's shoulders. Ahead of our first game in Kansas City, there were still question marks over our defending and our attack. Thirteen games later, and those questions are still bouncing around. Has anyone else noticed that we haven't been adequately prepared for a season since we were formed? In our first year, we had a back-three of Andy Boyens, Jim Brennan, and Marco Reda - none of whom had played an MLS match - in our first two matches, with wantaways like Richard Mulrooney and Paolo Nagamura as key components in our midfield. Last season it was the same story: Tyler Hemming started at right midfield in our first match in Columbus with Todd Dunivant on the opposite wing. It looks like this season is the same old story. An opening day win doesn't exactly count as a bright start, and we've only been over .500 by one game this season.
Additions like Adrian Serioux, Dwayne De Rosario, and draft picks Stefan Frei and Sam Cronin have all been hits. Here's the problem though: We still don't have a commanding centre half and we still don't have a lethal striker. We've needed both of these since 2006.
For the record, I don't think that Pablo Vitti's lack of scoring is one of our issues. You can see his talent whenever he has the ball. I believe our main issue is that just about every one of our good attacking moves ends with Chad Barrett, who has a worse soccer IQ than Tie Domi, and couldn't score a penalty on an empty net. His poor distribution and finishing is simply shocking at times, and when you couple this with Marco Velez's 2008-esque defending, we're in a pretty good position to fail.
The irony of this apparently terrible situation is that this team isn't out of it. The season's just about halfway done, and we're certainly in the playoff mix right now. With multi-game road trips and the Gold Cup looming this summer, the question remains as to whether or not will we be in that playoff mix come September? On this date last year, we were 6-4-2, and we faded over the summer to finish last in the East. Is there a supporter out there who sees any different destiny for this team?
Where's the freaking voice of reason here? Isn't it time for something to change?
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2 comments:
We all agree that "something" needs to be done. Fine, great. The catch 22 is that as long as people keep turning out in record numbers, I don't see where MLSE has any incentive to make sweeping changes (ie, spend money) even if they could make it work under the cap or with allocation or dp money.
Of course they'll need to field a better product when they increase seating capacity because they'll have to do some selling for a change . . . but that's not happening soon, as far as I know. Get ready for more mediocrity!
This is just one bad remake from last years season.
Losing to Vancouver put me over the edge.
1- To all those who said we didnt need a DP! Boy would'nt a real DP striker help now. You could put any has-been from europe and we'd be in first with Barretts chances.(But MLSE won't spend the money)
2- We have some big holes from the back to the middle and up front. Its always the same few who have no soccer sence for this level who countiune to break up the plays.
3- Carver leaving and bad managment are just the final nail in the coffin.
4- Under performers with big salaries the fat lady is sing !Naa Naa Naa Naa hey hey good bye.
You can fire the coach, GM, players but the real problem is MLSE they are in the business of making losers. When you run teams to make money and not to win you lose everytime to an owner who will do anything to win it all.
MLSE the bane of sport.
Season ticket holder since day one.
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